Clybourne Park

Editorial

Drama is an art form that has, for the most part, resisted the post-modern habit of "borrowing characters". A brief spin around the rolodex of office memory can come up with only one other notable instance of dramatic theft. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern appeared in Hamlet before they were killed by Tom Stoppard. Now, we see the trick again in this Pulitzer Prize winning play. Welcome the players from Lorraine Hansberry's lauded 1959 play A Raisin in the Sun.

Considered an uncertain investment at the time of its opening, the Hansberry play went on to win hearts, dollars and the zeitgeist in its portrayal of an African-American family living in Chicago. It seems that Norris has reprised not only characters but success in his redux picking up glowing reviews and another prize for drama, Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play.

To borrow the words of MTC's Artistic Director Simon Phillips, you need not be familiar with the original Hanberry work to enjoy this evening, "any more than you need to know the original song on which a jazz man constructs his improvisations."

All you need to know, really, is that you're likely to find a warm, smart piece that engages with the present even as it revives a theatrical past.

Helen Razer, Citysearch

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